Digital Commons Network^™

Intestinal Peptides And Ethnic Differences In Insulin Secretion, Paul B. Higgins

All ETDs from UAB

African Americans (AA) exhibit greater insulin responses following either an oral or intravenous glucose challenge relative to their European American (EA) counterparts. The etiology of this difference is not fully understood nor has it been confirmed with a more physiologically relevant mixed meal. Insulin secretion is regulated by a variety of factors. Significant among these are the enteric peptides glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) and glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP). The role of the incretin system in the ethnic differences in post challenge insulinemia has received little attention. Hence, the purpose of the study was two-fold. First, determine whether AA have higher fasting …

Constructing Indices Representing Supportiveness Of The Physical Environment For Walking Using The Rasch Measurement Model, Gavin R. Mccormack, Louise C. Mâsse, Max K. Bulsara, Terri J. Pikora, Billie Giles-Corti

Medical Papers and Journal Articles

Background: The objectives of this study were to use the Rasch model to 1) assess the psychometric properties of a physical environmental audit instrument and 2) to develop indices of interrelated environmental attributes that summarize environmental supportiveness for walking.

Methods: A set of items were derived representing two conceptual physical environmental constructs: 1) functional/safety, and; 2) aesthetics. Ad hoc criteria based on point-biserial and Rasch-based fit statistics were used to examine the construct validity and internal reliability of the two constructs.

Results: The Rasch-based fit statistics assisted in identifying 12 items that belonged to the functional/safety construct and 4 items …

University Of Texas At Tyler Catalog, 2006 - 2008, University Of Texas At Tyler

Catalogs

No abstract provided.

Combining Linear Regression With Reconstructability Analysis: A Study Of Differences In Health Status, Renato Carletti, Martin Zwick

Complex Systems Faculty Publications and Presentations

A linear regression model was used to predict variations in health status with the hypothesis that literacy level as a proximal measure for educational attainment would show a strong correlation with health status. Groups of other independent variables have also been introduced in the model to test whether the effect of literacy on health would have been mediated by other factors, or increased by them. The linear regression model did not show any strong relation between literacy and health, but pointed to other factors as predictors of health status.

Methods of data mining have been used for exploring throughout all …

The Effects Of Prejudice Level And Social Influence Strategy On Powerful People’S Responding To Racial Out-Group Members, Theresa K. Vescio, Sarah J. Gervais, Swen Heidenreich, Mark Snyder

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

This research tested the hypothesis that the responding of high, but not low, prejudice White Americans would vary as a function of manipulations of powerful people’s attention to subordinate strengths that facilitate goal strivings versus weaknesses that block goals. To examine this possibility, White participants were assigned to leader roles and an interaction with a low power Black “employee” was staged. Consistent with predictions, findings revealed that high prejudice White participants who were attentive to subordinate strengths and goal strivings versus subordinate weaknesses and blocked goals, evaluated and treated a Black employee more positively. The responding of low prejudice participants …

Cross-Subtype T-Cell Immune Responses Induced By A Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 Group M Consensus Env Immunogen, Eric A. Weaver, Zenaido T. Camacho, Fatiha Moukdar, Hua-Xin Liao, Ben-Jiang Ma, Mark Muldoon, James Theiler, Gary J. Nabel, Norman L. Letvin, Bette T. Korber, Beatrice H. Hahn, Barton F. Haynes, Feng Gao, Zhongjing Lu

Nebraska Center for Virology: Faculty Publications

The genetic diversity among globally circulating human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) strains is a serious challenge for HIV-1 vaccine design. We have generated a synthetic group M consensus env gene (CON6) for induction of cross-subtype immune responses and report here a comparative study of T-cell responses to this and natural strain env immunogens in a murine model. Three different strains of mice were immunized with CON6 as well as subtype A, B, or C env immunogens, using a DNA prime-recombinant vaccinia virus boost strategy. T-cell epitopes were mapped by gamma interferon enzyme-linked immunospot analysis using five overlapping Env peptide …

Human Sensory-Evoked Responses Differ Coincident With Either "Fusion-Memory" Or "Flash-Memory", As Shown By Stimulus Repetition-Rate Effects, Don L. Jewett, Toryalai Hart, Linda J. Larson-Prior, Bill Baird, Marram Olson, Michael Trumpis, Katherine Makayed, Payam Bavafa

Open Access Publications

No abstract provided.

Lsuhsc Facilities Biweekly Update: January 2006, Lsuhsc Property And Facilities Management

LSUHSC Facilities Biweekly Updates: 2006

LSUHSC Facilities Biweekly Updates from January 13 and 27, 2006.

These updates describe damage and a timeline of repairs at the LSU Health Sciences Center - New Orleans campus due to Hurricane Katrina which made landfall August 29, 2005.

Lsuhsc Facilities Daily Update: January 2006, Lsuhsc Property And Facilities Management

LSUHSC Facilities Daily Updates: 2006

LSUHSC Dailly Facilities Updates from January 2006. These updates describe damage and a timeline of repairs at the LSU Health Sciences Center - New Orleans campus due to Hurricane Katrina which made landfall August 29, 2005.

Advances And Applications Of Dezert-Smarandache Theory (Dsmt) For Information Fusion (Collected Works), Vol. 2, Florentin Smarandache, Jean Dezert

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

This second volume dedicated to Dezert-Smarandache Theory (DSmT) in Information Fusion brings in new fusion quantitative rules (such as the PCR1-6, where PCR5 for two sources does the most mathematically exact redistribution of conflicting masses to the non-empty sets in the fusion literature), qualitative fusion rules, and the Belief Conditioning Rule (BCR) which is different from the classical conditioning rule used by the fusion community working with the Mathematical Theory of Evidence.

Other fusion rules are constructed based on T-norm and T-conorm (hence using fuzzy logic and fuzzy set in information fusion), or more general fusion rules based on N-norm …

Introduction To N-Adaptive Fuzzy Models To Analyze Public Opinion On Aids, Florentin Smarandache, W.B. Vasantha Kandasamy

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

“AIDS is not simply a physical malady, it is also an artifact of social and sexual transgression, violated taboo, fractured identity—political and personal projections. Its key words are primarily the property of the powerful. AIDS: Keywords – is my attempt to identify and contest some of the assumptions underlying our current ‘knowledge’. In this effort I am joined by many AIDS activists including people living with AIDS— Acquired Immuno Deficiency Syndrome. “A syndrome is a pattern of symptoms pointing to a “morbid state” which may or may not be caused by infectious agents; a disease, on the other hand is, …

The Prevalence Of The Need For Esthetic Crown Lengthening In Post Orthodontically Treated Subjects, Bryan Marc Konikoff

Theses and Dissertations

Prevalence information on excessive gingival display in post-orthodontic patients is limited. By studying one aspect, namely the size relationship of the clinical crowns of teeth, in an orthodontic population, we can begin to quantify their need for periodontal plastic surgery. In this two part study, 200 plaster models were used as subjects, followed by a clinical exam of 31 of those subjects. These models represented patients before and directly after orthodontic therapy, and the Part 2 clinical exams were performed at least five years later. The lengths and widths of the six anterior teeth were measured and these values were …

Wavelet Analysis In Virtual Colonoscopy, Sharon Greenblum, Jiang Li, Adam Huang, Ronald M. Summers, Armando Manduca (Ed.), Amir A. Amini (Ed.)

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

The computed tomographic colonography (CTC) computer aided detection (CAD) program is a new method in development to detect colon polyps in virtual colonoscopy. While high sensitivity is consistently achieved, additional features are desired to increase specificity. In this paper, a wavelet analysis was applied to CTCCAD outputs in an attempt to filter out false positive detections. 52 CTCCAD detection images were obtained using a screen capture application. 26 of these images were real polyps, confirmed by optical colonoscopy and 26 were false positive detections. A discrete wavelet transform of each image was computed with the MATLAB wavelet toolbox using the …

Automatic Colonic Polyp Detection Using Multiobjective Evolutionary Techniques, Jiang Li, Adam Huang, Jianhua Yao, Ingmar Bitter, Nicholas Petrick, Ronald M. Summers, Perry J. Pickhardt, J. Richard Choi

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Colonie polyps appear like elliptical protrusions on the inner wall of the colon. Curvature based features for colonie polyp detection have proved to be successful in several computer-aided diagnostic CT colonography (CTC) systems. Some simple thresholds are set for those features for creating initial polyp candidates, sophisticated classification scheme are then applied on these polyp candidates to reduce false positives. There are two objective functions, the number of missed polyps and false positive rate, that need to be minimized when setting those thresholds. These two objectives conflict and it is usually difficult to optimize them both by a gradient search. …

Hybrid Committee Classifier For A Computerized Colonic Polyp Detection System, Jiang Li, Jianhua Yao, Nicholas Petrick, Ronald M. Summers, Amy K. Hara, Joseph M. Reinhardt (Ed.), Josien P.W. Pluim (Ed.)

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

We present a hybrid committee classifier for computer-aided detection (CAD) of colonic polyps in CT colonography (CTC). The classifier involved an ensemble of support vector machines (SVM) and neural networks (NN) for classification, a progressive search algorithm for selecting a set of features used by the SVMs and a floating search algorithm for selecting features used by the NNs. A total of 102 quantitative features were calculated for each polyp candidate found by a prototype CAD system. 3 features were selected for each of 7 SVM classifiers which were then combined to form a committee of SVMs classifier. Similarly, features …

Neck Loading In High Performance Combat Pilots During Aerial Combat Manoeuvres And Specific Neck Strengthening Exercises, Kevin J. Netto

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Background: Neck pain and injury is a common occurrence in high performance combat pilots (HPCP) around the world. The cause of this has been attributed to exposure to the unavoidable high mechanical loading related to the neck being positioned in non-neutral head postures whilst being exposed to moderate to high +Gz levels. Specific neck conditioning exercises have been proposed as being a possible method to decrease the incidence of neck pain and injury in this population. However, there has been sparsely published research examining the suitability of selected exercises for HPCP who participate in regular aerial combat manoeuvres (ACM).

Interdependency Of Pharmacokinetic Parameters: A Chicken-And-Egg Problem? Not!, Reza Mehvar

Pharmacy Faculty Articles and Research

Pharmacokinetic (PK) software packages are widely used by scientists in different disciplines to estimate PK parameters. However, their use without a clear understanding of physiological parameters affecting the PK parameters and how different PK parameters are related to each other may result in erroneous interpretation of data. Often, mathematical relationships used for the estimation of PK parameters obscure the true physiological relationships among these parameters, prompting a discussion of which parameter came first and giving the appearance of the-chicken-and-the-egg dilemma. In this article, the author attempts to show how different PK parameters are related to physiological parameters and each other …

Application Of Cognitive Engineering Principles To The Redesign Of A Dichotomous Identification Key For Parasitology

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Dichotomous identification keys are used throughout biology for identification of plants, insects, and parasites. However, correct use of identification keys can be difficult as they are not usually intended for novice users who may not be familiar with the terminology used or with the morphology of the organism being identified. Therefore, we applied cognitive engineering principles to redesign a parasitology identification key for the Internet. We addressed issues of visual clutter and spatial distance by displaying a single question couplet at a time and by switching to the appropriate next couplet after the user made a choice. Our analysis of …

A Time-Motion Study Of Registered Nurses’ Workflow In Intensive Care Unit Remote Monitoring, Todd R. Johnson

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Utilizing advanced information technology, Intensive Care Unit (ICU) remote monitoring allows highly trained specialists to oversee a large number of patients at multiple sites on a continuous basis. In the current research, we conducted a time-motion study of registered nurses’ work in an ICU remote monitoring facility. Data were collected on seven nurses through 40 hours of observation. The results showed that nurses’ essential tasks were centered on three themes: monitoring patients, maintaining patients’ health records, and managing technology use. In monitoring patients, nurses spent 52% of the time assimilating information embedded in a clinical information system and 15% on …

Mapping Concepts In Medical Error Taxonomies, Jiajie Zhang, James P. Turley

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

No abstract provided.

Using Citation Data To Improve Retrieval From Medline, Madurai G Sriram, William R Hersh

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether algorithms developed for the World Wide Web can be applied to the biomedical literature in order to identify articles that are important as well as relevant. DESIGN AND MEASUREMENTS A direct comparison of eight algorithms: simple PubMed queries, clinical queries (sensitive and specific versions), vector cosine comparison, citation count, journal impact factor, PageRank, and machine learning based on polynomial support vector machines. The objective was to prioritize important articles, defined as being included in a pre-existing bibliography of important literature in surgical oncology. RESULTS Citation-based algorithms were more effective than noncitation-based algorithms at identifying important articles. …

A Hybrid Model For Reducing Ecological Bias, Ruth Salway, Jon Wakefield

UW Biostatistics Working Paper Series

A major drawback of epidemiological ecological studies, in which the association between area-level summaries of risk and exposure are used to make inference about individual risk, is the difficulty in characterising within-area variability in exposure and confounder variables. To avoid ecological bias, samples of individual exposure/confounder data within each area are required. Unfortunately these may be difficult or expensive to obtain, particularly if large samples are required. In this paper we propose a new approach suitable for use with small samples. We combine a Bayesian non-parametric Dirichlet process prior with an estimating functions approach, and show that this model gives …

Health-Exposure Modelling And The Ecological Fallacy, Jon Wakefield, Gavin Shaddick

UW Biostatistics Working Paper Series

Recently there has been increased interest in modelling the association between aggregate disease counts and environmental exposures measured, for example via air pollution monitors, at point locations. This paper has two aims: first we develop a model for such data in order to avoid ecological bias; second we illustrate that modelling the exposure surface and estimating exposures may lead to bias in estimation of health effects. Design issues are also briefly considered, in particular the loss of information in moving from individual to ecological data, and the at-risk populations to consider in relation to the pollution monitor locations. The approach …

Model Checking For Roc Regression Analysis, Tianxi Cai, Yingye Zheng

Harvard University Biostatistics Working Paper Series

The Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve is a prominent tool for characterizing the accuracy of continuous diagnostic test. To account for factors that might invluence the test accuracy, various ROC regression methods have been proposed. However, as in any regression analysis, when the assumed models do not fit the data well, these methods may render invalid and misleading results. To date practical model checking techniques suitable for validating existing ROC regression models are not yet available. In this paper, we develop cumulative residual based procedures to graphically and numerically assess the goodness-of-fit for some commonly used ROC regression models, and …

Spatial Autocorrelation Of Deer-Vehicle Accidents In Vigo County, J. Scott Horn

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Deer-vehicle accidents (DV As) are a problem in many areas. They cause millions of dollars in property damage, personal injury, and loss of life each year. This thesis examines whether DVAs in Vigo County, Indiana during the year 2000 were spatially autocorrelated; and whether DV As selected by deer habitat were spatially autocorrelated. Specifically using Moran's I to test for spatial autocorrelation this study determined if and to what degree spatial autocorrelation existed among these DVAs. A Moran's I value of .0023 shows that the accidents occurred randomly. These DV A data were then used to plot a map which …

Bayer Ag V. Housey Pharmaceuticals: Protection For Biotechnological Research Tools Under Section 271(G) Found Wanting, Matthew Barthalow

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

[Excerpt] "Research tools, a subset of biotechnological inventions protected by process patents, are “tools that scientists use in the laboratory, including cell lines, monoclonal antibodies, reagents, animal models, growth factors, combinatorial chemistry and DNA libraries, clones and cloning tools (such as PCR), methods, laboratory equipment and machines.” Many companies base their business models on the ability to find pharmaceutical products using their proprietary drug discovery research tools. Research tools used for drug discovery ‘include bioinformatic methods for identifying the interaction of certain proteins and their association with disease, methods for confirming protein targets, screening assays to identify molecules active against …

Message From The Provost, The Mcnair Team

McNair Scholars Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Mcnair Scholars Program, The Mcnair Team

McNair Scholars Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Full Issue, The Mcnair Team

McNair Scholars Research Journal

No abstract provided.

A Cross-Cultural Study Of Hearing And Hearing-Impaired Children’S Human Figure Drawings, Chia-Liang Timothy Hu

EVMS School of Health Professions Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to further the research of human figure drawings as useful assessment tools and add to the understanding of children’s human figure drawings from a cross-cultural perspective.

In this quantitative study, 147 human figure drawings made by 59 hearing and 64 hearing-impaired Taiwanese children and 24 hearing-impaired American children were collected. In addition, 50 drawings done by hearing American children were randomly chosen from the children’s drawing database of Eastern Virginia Medical School Graduate Art Therapy Program. Five Formal Elements Art Therapy Scales (FEATS) scales were modified for use with human figure drawings and were …